Friday, August 29, 2008

Amazing stuff happens when you pray about them. Three days ago the 93-year-old man that I help take care of took a bit of a slide for the worse. He is still ok, but his doctor doesn't want him to do most things on his own anymore. Well, I told his daughter that I would be willing to watch him on the weekdays and only work on the weekends for the time being. She is doing away with the rent in lieu of this. I think this is only fair, and I have felt an obligation to help with him. This had all happened AFTER I had been to my supervisor and told him I REALLY needed full time. The staffing service lady was trying to jump through hoops to get me "in" the company and start to work full time by next week. Well, I never did get a call for the orientation on Wednesday, so I called them and my name wasn't on the list! Well, I was just about ready to have a cow when the old guy's daughter called me and told me what the doctor had said. She had been praying for somebody to show up for awhile now that would be able to stay with him and watch him most of the time without needing them to pay alot, because they don't have alot of money. Well, I show up only working weekends!

I told her that if I didn't have to pay rent, then the money I make on the weekends would be plenty for me to live off of, and that I would do this for awhile. I don't know how long this is going to go on, but we are only going to take this one day at a time for now. A friend of the old guy is going to come visit him on Monday, and she is willing to stay for 3 weeks! So that is going to help out alot.

I told the Staffing service lady about my living situation and that I could wait awhile before I started working full time. She said that it was no problem at all, and when I was ready to work full time, just leave her a message at the HR office and she would get me into orientation ASAP.

I had been praying for a long time now for God to use me wherever He needed me. I feel like the last 8 years he has used me in situations I never thought I would be in, and certainly no situation I would have picked lol. But when God uses you, it's for His purpose, not ours. The daughter and I had a talk about this and was just amazed at how it all worked out like it did. She was about ready to have a nervous breakdown when I showed up and she is now starting to feel like she can pull back a little bit and let others help out more.

Anyway, now to my book; I am reading a bit of history this time, a book called Constantinople, Capital of Byzantium by Jonathan Harris. I am about halfway through it and it talks about the city's fortification and some of the myths that the leaders fed about the city. One part that I found really interesting was when the muslims were conquering the areas and they were trying to take over Constantinople, the christians were perplexed as to why God was allowing this to happen, thinking they were doing something wrong to have this happen to them. One of the few things that they knew about the muslims was that they considered any kind of statue a form of idolatry. The christians decided that must be the reason why their city was in trouble, so a bunch of them decided to try to get ride of all the statues. Well, there was a HUGE outcry about that because half the christians wanted the statues, while the other half wanted to keep them. Then a wise old monk said that it's not the statues that our worshipped, it's the person behind the statues. Well, that made everyone feel better so they decided not to tear down all the statues.

The people saved their city from the invasion by a weapon called "Greek Fire". It was concocted from a mixture of ingredients that was probably sulfer, pitch, and quicklime, and possibly crude oil because at that time surface deposits were available. This was highly inflammable when it was heated and could be shot onto an enemy ship and the flames could not be put out. It would even burn on water. This demoralized the enemy, esp when it burst from the siphon like thunder and it was fired from the bronze heads of lions and dragons. The Arabs dropped back at that point and the city was saved.

Saturday, August 23, 2008

Ok, people may be wondering how I got this blog name. The name is actually a combination of two horses, Visionaire and Mouse Soup. Also, It works very well with Annie, because as you can see, she is sleeping soundly on the chair, and you can just imagine she is dreaming of mouse soup lol. Visionaire ran in the Kentucky Derby and came in 12th. He has been brought back to sprinting and he won the King's Bishop stakes today at Saratoga! http://racing.bloodhorse.com/article/46730.htmAs for Mouse Soup, she is a little two-year-old who hasn't raced yet. She is busy being galloping buddies with Nicanor, Barbaro's younger brother. That was my other news!

Boy I have lots of stuff to write about today, but I will post it in two posts to make it easier to read.First off, I will be converting from Integrity to Amazon.com on August 31st! The floor supervisor was not happy that I hadn't gotten a phone call for an interview yet. He really got onto the Integrity lady about that, because I had told him that I may have to quit to find another job if I wasn't able to get full time really soon. Integrity Lady jumped through hoops to get me an unscheduled drug test and totally bypassed my interview lol. I will be going, I think Wednesday, to a meeting where I will hear all about the company and their policies and insurance and such. It will be an 8 hour meeting. He told Integrity lady that I will be working the Wed thru Sat shift. I told him I would be interested in the M,Tues,Thurs, Fri shift also, but he said no, he wanted me on his shift lol. So at least I know I am wanted!Ok I am reading a really good book that everyone needs to read, called The Edge Effect, by Eric R. Braverman, MD. He talks about the four primary chemical neurotransmitters and how they can cause so many physical and mental problems. We all are dominant in one of the chemicals, and some of us are dramatically deficient in others. Thankfully I seem to be ok. I am GABA dominant and slightly dopamine deficient. The book sends you through a whole bunch of questions and you answer yes or no, and you can tell from that what you are. Then there are chapters to help you learn how to combat your deficiencies and learn about your dominant chemical. Its really interesting! He talks about how doctors are giving patients the wrong meds because what is really wrong is their deficiency, and not any one problem. A patient will go in to the doctor for one problem, so the doc gives them meds for it, then a month later, that problem goes away and another one comes up. It keeps happening until the patient is a big mess. He gives numerous examples how he dealt with their chemical deficiency and the patient was able to get back to normal. He also gives you a web site that allows you to check your brain speed (mine is 36 milliseconds). http://bfc.positscience.com/eval/bst.php

Ok I don't want to ruin the book! Again, its called The Edge Effect, by Eric R. Braverman, MD.

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Not a whole lot going on today! I am still waiting for The Call. I think that's what I am going to call it from now on lol. I am about done reading "Overtreated". WOW, everyone needs to read that book! There is so much in it to talk about I think I would have to write several blogs about it. One chapter, called "Money, Drugs, and Lies" talks about how drug companies spun their drug testing to hide risks. It also talks about drug representatives and how they influence doctor's prescribing habits. The most heavily marketed drugs are the ones Physicians wind up prescribing. The reps give the doctors all kinds of expensive gifts, dinners, even pay for home improvements to get them to use their drugs. Another chapter talked about the New England Journal of Medicine and how they are influenced by the pharm. Industry. Doctors have to be taught how to read through the bias of the articles to make sure they are giving their patients the right medicine.On the other hand, the book also talks about patients and how they diagnose themselves on the internet, and then go to their doctors and tell them what they have, then tell them what drug they want. the doctors have a horrible time convincing them they really don't have that problem, but apparently alot of times they don't have the time to argue with a patient, so they give them what they want.Alot of time is also given to insurance companies, and how family physicians who just want to practice family medicine can't because when companies change insurance policies, the patients go too.Again, the book is called "Overtreated; Why too much medicine is making us sicker and poorer" by Shannon Brownlee.

Thursday, August 14, 2008

I got something very interesting in the mail today. A little booklet, that on the front page says that ..."I can guarantee I can help you get rid of ALL your financial problems..."!!! Well isn't that nice? Apparently, if you let go of all your suppressed feelings about money, you can make loads of money. For example, Make a list of what you like about money, then make a list of what you don't like about money. Then go thru this "release" technique to get rid of ALL your ideas about money, then WHAMMO! Money will come to you like water out of a faucet. The idea is to stop being concerned about whether you have money or not. I did some research on the internet about this, and apparently it does work, at least that's what it says. Your supposed to touch certain parts of your face to get rid of all the negative energy or something like that. Very amusing. Another part of this booklet says that there are no such things as germs, it's all in your head when you get sick. Well.....ok lol.I read today that Pimlico racetrack is closing it's doors to training because of money problems. If they don't fix these problems, they may not open up next year and its adios for the Preakness.Well, Annie and Heidi are NOT going to get along. Heidi is Dr. Martin's tuxedo cat. When I go into the TV room to watch tv Annie likes to come in there too. Well, Heidi also likes to go in there and she doesn't like Annie. Heidi used to just hiss at her and that's it. Now she goes up to Annie and bats at her. Annie now runs away from Heidi. She used to just sit there and look at her.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

There isn't much going on today. I am waiting to hear from Amazon.com about a transition interview. Once That happens, I will be working full time. I did go to the library and I checked out a book called Overtreated; Why Too Much Medicine Is Making Us Sicker And Poorer, by Shannon Brownlee. It talks about health care being so expensive, that 1 out of 6 Americans don't have insurance, how the health care system overtreats which puts patient's lives in danger, and how they undertreat and kill patients. In the introduction a 12-year old boy dies from a brain infection that started out as a rotten tooth. His mother couldn't find a dentist that would take Medicaid payments so the little boy died. The extraction was going to cost $80, but she couldn't afford it, but it cost the District of Columbia $250,000 for the boy being in the hospital with the brain infection. This happened in 2007! I don't know the whole background to this story, but no matter what it is, it is really horrible.I said in my last blog I was going to read Reasonable Faith, but my brain was hurting from the last book, so I thought I would take a rest.